Apprentice Repertory Company Performances 2024

Eren Overmyer – Western Michigan University: Julius Caesar, Clue, On The Town, The Tempest, The Thread Men, Private Lives. Queer Theatre Kalamazoo: Man and Moon. Currently a Junior in WMU’s acting program.

Robert Fennessey-Stevenson Jr.- Commonwealth Shakespeare Apprentice Repertory Company:  Two Noble Kinsmen. Robert is a local actor from Quincy, MA. He is excited and grateful for the opportunity at CSC’s Apprentice Program and would like to thank his mother and his sister Kate for all their love and support.

James Helsinger- Orlando Shakespeare Theater: Love’s Labor’s Lost, Measure for Measure, Othello, The Tempest. Boone High School: The Pajama Game, The Lightning Thief, Guys and Dolls, Tartuffe, Matilda, Mamma Mia. Shenandoah University: King Lear, Comedy of Errors, Henry V. He is a BFA acting student at Shenandoah University.

Natasha Dias- Massasoit Community Theater: Othello, Eurydice, Out of Many, We Are, Winter People. UMass Boston: The Party Hop, Loud Noises. Canton Community Theater: Chicago. Natasha is currently focusing on her acting career in theater and film. She is thankful to all those who support her. @natashavdias

Aaron Lehner- Improv Asylum House Teams. Fitchburg State MainStage: Rot From Beneath. Sherwood Entertainment: Twelfth Night. Safe Haven Ballet: Romeo & Juliet, Don Quixote, The Nutcracker, How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Acting Out! Theater Lawrence, MA: One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Southern Comfort, Love/Sick, Spamalot, Urinetown.

Gabriel Hopper – Metropolitan Community College Longview: Broken Hearts, A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the Forum, The Lion in Winter, Holiday Variety Show and Without Rule of Law. Gabriel has also participated in the KCACTF competition as a semi-finalist partner.

Paul St. Cyr- TC Squared Theatre Company: Nineteen Lights at Breeze Knoll. Chelsea Theater Works: Hamlet, Robin B. Goode. Lynn Arts After Hours: Short and Scary, Kings. Boston University Shakespeare Society: Richard II, Henry IV Part 1, King Lear, Macbeth, The Taming of The Shrew. Paul has also had an original play produced for a staged reading by the Boston University Philosophy Department.

Ysabel Cardona – Suffolk University: It Can’t Happen Here, Midsummer; Kinda? Massachusettes College of Liberal Arts: Urinetown, The Tempest, Mr Burns: A Post Electric Play, The Secret History (reading), Pink Collar Crime (reading). Ysabel is a current student at Suffolk University, majoring in Theatre and minoring in Creative Writing.

Melody Small – Studio Theatre: Macbeth, SpongeBob The Musical. The Arkansas Repertory Theatre: A Christmas Story, Charlie Brown Christmas, Willy Wonka Jr, African Mean Girls Play. Murry’s Dinner Playhouse: Elf, Annie, The Little Mermaid. Argenta Contemporary Theatre: Ragtime.

Abigail Hunnewell (Apprentice) – Groton School Theater: Antigone, Legally Blonde, Anon(ymous), The Wolves, Twelve Angry Jurors, Rinse the Blood off my Toga, and Urinetown. Abigail is currently pursuing her Acting BFA at Syracuse University. @Abiwelles

Nadia Jewel Vito- Boston Conservatory: Next to Normal (Diana), The Convent (Tina), Significant Other (Kiki), Hookman (Chloe), 1984 (Telescreen). Algonquin Arts Theatre: Tommy (Mrs. Walker). Phoenix Productions: Spring Awakening (Martha). Bellarine Theatre Company: The Fantasticks (Luisa), Big Fish (Young Sandra). A Rising Senior at the Boston Conservatory. Nadia is also a Boston-area tour guide! @nadiajewelvito

Shania Jackson- Post Theatre Company: She Kills Monster, Men on Boats, Love’s Labour’s Lost. Broadway Concert Series: Carousel. Shania is a rising senior at LIU Post. She will be graduating with a BFA in Musical Theatre. @shaniajacksxn

Matthew Killion – Suffolk University: It Can’t Happen Here, Romeo and Juliet, Metamorphoses, Pilgrims of the Night, Midsummer; Kinda?, In The Absence of Maeve McGuire, A Nickel, The Strange Ballad of Mickey O’Neil. He loves acting, directing and playwriting.

Rayhan Khimji- Point Park University: Rabbit Hole, Central Stage Theatre: Hamlet, Amadeus, A Monster Calls, Too Much Memory, 12 Angry Jurors, A View From The Bridge, The Music Man, The SpongeBob Musical, Mean Girls: High School Version, Mamma Mia! Rayhan just completed his first year at Point Park University’s Conservatory of Performing Arts as a BFA Acting student. Rayhankhimji@gmail.com @rayhankhimji

Gabriel Semrau is a director, actor, playwright and overall nuisance currently studying theater at Oberlin college, where he is testing the waters to see just how freaky the theater organizations will let him get. Gabriel embraces the bizarre, creating strange, experimental works that push the limits of what audiences are willing to put up with. A random, miscellaneous assortment of his credits includes Ubu Roi (Director) with OMTA/OSTA, We Will Rock You (Khashoggi/Sets Crew) with A2CT, and The Visit (Burgomaster) with Community Ensemble Theater.

Bryce Mathieu- Commonwealth Shakespeare Apprentice Repertory Company debut! Films:” Little Women”, “Don’t Look up”, “I Wanna Dance With Somebody”, “The Holdovers”, “The Divide”, “Ice Cold”, “BORPË”, “Continental Breakfast”. Endless thanks to God&family. IMDB@brycemathieu

Carly Dreme Calbreath – Carly is a California-born, Boston-based actor, writer, and educator with a particular passion for sci-fi, fantasy, and Shakespeare. She is also a Creative Facilitation Fellow for the Jewish Studio Project and a member of Riot Improv. When she’s not playing with film, theater, novels or poetry, Carly’s probably building upon her Midrash Improv curriculum. Or, she’s playing video games. carlydremecalbreath.com @CarlyDreme

Sasha Aronson – Atlantic Acting School, 2023-present. She has trained at various short programs at LAMDA, HB Studio, and more.

Melanie Kaplan- Sharon High School: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Into The Woods, Legally Blonde. Uncommon Theatre Company: Cabaret, The Addams Family. Ensemble Performing Arts Studio: Pippin. Mansfield YMCA: Chicago. She is currently at The Hartt School for Actor Training. @melanie.kaplan

Jessica Sconfienza- Montclair State University: Elephant’s Graveyard, The Thin Place, Black Snow, Curious Incident, and The Last Days of Judas Iscariot. Teatro LATEA: An Empty Museum. CCM Dragonetti Theatre: Father of the Bride and The Laramie Project. Film+TV: “Stations” (short, Dir. Esther Soca). jessicasconfienza.com @jessica.sconfienza

Jacob Casper – Williams College Department of Theatre: Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812 (Dolokhov), The Phantom Tollbooth (Stage Manager/Assistant Director), with witchcraft in our lips (Assistant Stage Manager). Williams College Cap & Bells: Eurydice (Father), She Kills Monsters (Orcus), Pippin (Ensemble), High School Musical (Stage Manager). Currently studying at Williams College.

Sophia Plaitakis – She is currently getting her BFA in Acting and minors in Dance and English at SUNY Fredonia. SUNY Fredonia: The Crucible, Abigail/1702, Radium Girls. @sophiaplaitakis

Katie “Perry” O’Neill — Has recently been seen on the Suffolk University stage in semester showcases as well as Pilgrims of the Night, Metamorphoses, Working: a Musical, Midsummer, Kinda?, It Can’t Happen here.

Elanah Bruce- Shakespeare on the Sound: As You Like It, As You Like It for Kids, Budding Bards Festival. Nashville Shakespeare Festival with Lipscomb University: Hamlet. Lipscomb University: Pride and Prejudice. Springhouse Theatre Company: Anne of Green Gables. Elanah is an acting major with a film minor at Lipscomb University and will graduate in May of 2025. She works in film in Nashville. @elanahcharis

Fiona MacPhail – A current student at NYU Tisch School of the Arts and a recent graduate of The Stella Adler Studio of Acting. She also studies Italian Studies at the NYU CAS. Commonwealth Shakespeare Apprentice Repertory Co: Richard II. Stella Adler Studio of Acting: In Arabia We’d All Be Kings, The Odyssey, The Tempest, Our Town, Retrofits, The Martha Mitchell Effect. Winthrop Drama Society: Rock of Ages, Chicago, Anything Goes, Faustus, Golem, Fallen, Clue: OnStage. @fionaeliza

Ryan Scott Cooke (she/her) – Northwestern University: How To Know The Wildflowers: A Map. Boston Conservatory: Dead Man Walking. The Cambridge School of Weston: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Pippin, and The Visit. Massachusetts High School Drama Festival: The 39 Steps, A Wrinkle In Time. Ryan has also worked with Carnegie Mellon University, Interlochen Arts, The Broadway Collective, Boston City Singers, and Blue Man Group Boston. She is majoring in theater at Northwestern University. Much love to her moms. @ryan_cooke_1205

Lucy Bertolet – Fresh Ink Theatre: Orpheus in the Overworld, Kidding Around: A Wrinkle in Time, Trapology: Onyx Veil Gala. Lucy has also been seen in various student films and television shows at Emerson College including Speedwell, Softie, and AiDA. She is an illustrator by day, and graduated Emerson College in 2023 with a Theatre and Performance BFA and a minor in Science. @lucy.bert

Gillian Weatherford- Ohio Light Opera- Hello Dolly, Cinderella, The Student Prince, Pirates of Penzance, Regional Theatre of the Palouse- Beautiful, College Light Opera Company- Trouble in Tahiti, Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder, Very Good Eddie, The Wizard of Oz, Pirates of Penzance, The Sorcerer, The Danger Year (world premiere) Off Off Broadway- Damnation! The Musical, Off-Broadway- A Sketch of New York, NYU Steinhardt- Nine, Orpheus in the Underworld, Storm, Speed Dating Tonight!, Trial Period, The Magic Flute. She is a New York City-based performer. gillianweatherford.com @weatherfordcast

Holly Rust- Salem State University: Othello, Blood Wedding, The Thing They Love, The Heidi Chronicles, Orlando, The Laramie Project, The Visit. Firehouse Center for the Arts: The Sixth or The Eighth. Weston Drama Workshop: Six Characters in Search of an Author. New Ways Theatre: She Kills Monsters. The Orange Players: The Murder of Crows.

Angelina Kemmett- BU On Broadway: Off Broadway (Choir/Director). Cambridge Center for Adult Education: The Unwanted, August: Osage County, This Day Forward, Christmas Breaks. BU: False Idols and Glass Titans. BU Wandering Minds: Peter/Wendy, The Haunting of Hill House. BU Shakespeare Society: Macbeth, Othello, The Taming of the Shrew, The Winter’s Tale, As You Like It. @angelinakemmett

Meghan Cohen- BFA in Drama with minors in Musical Theatre and Journalism from Hofstra University (2023). Hofstra University credits: The Wolves, The Threepenny Opera, Significant Other, Little Women. Represented by Baker Management. Meghan would like to thank her family for their endless support. meghan-cohen.com

Victoria Townsend is a Boston-based director, teaching-artist and occasional performer who has been working with CSC since 2011. Directing Credits: For CSC: A Midsummer Night’s Dream (2023), As You Like It (2022) and several Boston Theater Marathon pieces; Emerging Playwright’s Festival (Wheelock Family Theater), Cosi Fan Tutte (New England Conservatory’s UGOS Program), The Memorandum (Flat Earth Theater). Assistant Directing Credits: Fear and Misery in the Third Reich, Kiss me Kate, Romeo and Juliet and Shakespeare and Leadership (CSC) and L’Egisto (NEC/UGOS). She has also served as a teaching-artist for Watertown Children’s Theater and Live Arts Education. A Massachusetts native, Victoria currently resides in Woburn and is a graduate of Saint Michael’s College in Vermont with degrees in Theatre and English Literature and holds a certificate in Social Impact Management and Leadership from the Institute for Nonprofit Practice & Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life at Tufts University.

Regine Vital (she/her/hers) is a theatre artist, administrator, educator, scholar, and storyteller from Somerville, MA. As an actor, director, dramaturge, and coach, she has worked with several Boston area theatre companies, including Commonwealth Shakespeare Company, ArtsEmerson, Company One, Central Square Theatre, HUB Theatre Company, Fresh Ink Theatre, and Flat Earth Theatre. She has taught composition, introductory literature, and public speaking at the college level; text and performance to high schoolers; and continuing adult education classes in literature. Regine holds degrees from Boston University, UMass Boston, and studied Shakespeare at King’s College, London and Shakespeare’s Globe. Currently, she is the Manager of Curriculum and Instruction at The Huntington.

William Shakespeare was a renowned English poet, playwright, and actor born in 1564, in Stratford-upon-Avon. His birthday is most commonly celebrated on 23 April, which is also believed to be the date on which he died in 1616. Shakespeare was a prolific writer during the Elizabethan and Jacobean ages of British theatre (sometimes referred to as the English Renaissance or the Early Modern Period). Shakespeare’s plays are perhaps his most enduring legacy, but they are not the only things he wrote. Shakespeare’s poetry has also remained popular to this day.

Shakespeare’s work includes 38 plays, 2 narrative poems, a collection of 154 sonnets, and other poems as well. No original manuscripts of Shakespeare’s plays are known to exist today, and about half of Shakespeare’s plays are only available to us because a group of actors in his company collected them for publication after his death. These writings were brought together in what is known as the First Folio (‘Folio’ refers to the size of the paper used). It contained 36 of his plays, and none of his poetry. Shakespeare’s legacy is as rich and diverse as his work; his plays have spawned countless adaptations across multiple genres and cultures, and his plays have had an enduring presence on stage and film.

His writings have been compiled in various iterations of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by different entities, which usually include all of his plays, his sonnets, and his other poems. From Stratford to London and beyond, William Shakespeare was and is one of the most important literary figures of the English language.